


Instinct

by Elleohl



Category: One Direction (Band)
Genre: Crimes & Criminals, Dark, Kidnapping, M/M, Missing Persons, Mystery, Police, Slow Burn
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-01-13
Updated: 2021-01-13
Packaged: 2021-03-18 07:15:03
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 5
Words: 4,616
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28739352
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Elleohl/pseuds/Elleohl
Summary: Gemma Styles is missing.Harry Styles is missing a piece of himself.Can Detective Tomlinson help save either one of them?
Relationships: Harry Styles/Louis Tomlinson
Comments: 1
Kudos: 6





	1. Chapter 1

**DAY 1**

“Hello, police, what’s your emergency?” 

Harry felt foolish hearing the voice on the other end of the line. It had been 10 hours. Maybe she had just forgotten or fell asleep or her phone died and she didn’t have a charger. Yet the sinking feeling in his heart argued with all of those plausible explanations. He knew her. He knew this wasn’t like her. At all. 

“Hello? Can you hear me? Is there an emergency?” 

He cleared his throat before replying, “yeah, erm- it’s my sister, Gemma, I believe she’s missing.” The thought leaving his brain and formulating into words out of his mouth sent a shiver down his entire body. 

“Okay, when was the last time you spoke with her?” The operator had a very to the point tone to their voice. 

“Earlier today. We were supposed to meet for dinner, but she never showed up and she’s not answering my calls or texts.” 

“And how old is your sister sir?” 

“She’s just turned 30.”

Harry could have sworn he heard a chuckle before the operators response. Maybe this was ridiculous. Gemma was an adult. He knew from the many late night crimes shows that he would watch while battling bouts of insomnia that adults had every right to go missing if they wanted. But he just couldn’t shake the feeling that something was terribly wrong. 

“Okay sir, if you’d like I can send someone to you to collect a report at their convenience if you’d like, but please call back if she shows up to cancel so no time is wasted.” 

“Okay, thank you,” Harry gulped. He was truly hoping he wasn’t wasting anyone’s time. 

After giving the operator the address to his flat, he hung up the phone and tried Gemma once more. 

_Hi, this is Gemma, sorry for missing your call. Leave me a message and I’ll get back to you as soon as I can._

Harry paced the entirety of his flat 28 times, which really wasn’t too hard to do because of how small it was, but with every turn, he felt the walls closing in even more. 

Nearly 3 hours later, Harry was startled awake by a stern knocking on the door. He picked himself up from the armchair that he had somehow fallen asleep on, rubbed the sleep from his eyes and made it to the door.  
The open door revealed a man standing in a white shirt and black vest, he quickly realized the entire night before wasn’t in fact a nightmare as he was hoping it may have been. 

“Good morning, I’m Officer Phillips with City of London Police. Harold Still was it?” The man flipped through the notebook in his hand to double check the name.  
“It’s Styles, Harry Styles.”  
“Ah- Harry, okay sorry bout that. So your sister is missing is that right?”  
“Yes sir.” The sinking feeling returned.  
“Okay, may I?” The officer slid past Harry in attempt to make it into the flat.  
“Of course, come in. Could I get you anything to drink?” Harry offered.  
“Tea would be great. It’s bloody cold out there tonight.” 

Harry prepared the kettle on the stove as he watched the officer take a seat at his small dining table. 

“So your sisters name is Gemma?” The policeman asked, flipping out his notebook and pen.  
“Yes sir.” Harry answered with the image of Gemma’s bright smile flashing through his mind.  
“When was the last you spoke with her?”  
“Erm- yesterday around 1pm. So,” Harry glanced at the small wooden clock that sat upon the kitchen counter next to the sink “13 or so hours ago?”  
The officer’s hand stopped scribbling his notes almost immediately and dropped his pen to the table. 

“Son,” the officer started, squeezing his brow between his thumb and pointer, sighing in obvious frustration or disbelief or just general 2am sighs, “Gemma is an adult. I don’t think her not answering a phone call is grounds to get the Queen’s Army involved.”  
“No, I’m sorry and I know how silly it must seem, but I know my sister just about as well as I know myself and this isn’t like her at all.” Harry tried to explain.  
“I understand being worried, but I’m sure she’ll show up. She’s likely just lost her phone or something.” The officer let out another sigh. “ if you still have not heard from her by Friday, come down to the station and we’ll get an official report on record, okay?” The officer stood from his seat.  
“Yeah, um, okay.” Harry nodded his head.  
“You have a good night Harry. Good luck with your sister.”  
The officer walked the few steps to the door and was gone before Harry could ask, “what about your tea?” 

Harry sank back to the old armchair in the living room and pulled his phone from his pocket.  
No new notifications. He dialed again-

_Hi, this is Gemma, sorry for missing your call. Leave me a message and I’ll get back to you as soon as I can.”_

“Please Gem” Harry whispered.


	2. Chapter 2

**Day 2**

“Gemma, don’t know if you’re getting this, but I’m worried sick. Please call Harry or I back as soon as you can. Just let us know that you’re okay sweetheart.” Anne set her phone down atop the faux marble tabletop.  
“Mum?” Harry questioned his mother with a lump in his throat he had been trying to swallow down the entire morning, all throughout work, and the cab ride to the restaurant to meet with his mom, Anne.  
“I know baby.” She grabbed hold of Harry’s hands and gave them a squeeze. “But we’ve got to try and stay positive, yeah?” She forced a grin.  
Harry’s mom was always a painfully positive person, always seeing the cup half full and all that. Most of the time he loved her for this, but in this case, he didn’t want any positivity until his sister was home safe.  
Harry shook his head to try and focus on the subject at hand. “Have you called Michal?” 

Michal and Gemma had dated for several years but had now been broken up for 8 or so months. They would still occasionally FaceTime to catch up about life, and they’d often text each other funny memes. Michal had now moved to Thailand to experience something new, likely to distance himself from the breakup and immense heartbreak that they went through during and post relationship. Gemma would tell Harry that Michal was “the one that got away” and “it was just bad timing” but he knew that both of them still cared deeply about one another. 

“He hasn’t heard from her since the beginning of the month.” Anne’s shoulders fell to a slump.  
Harry let out a sigh. “I messaged a couple of her friends and they haven’t talked to her either. Same with the studio. She was in all of last week and Monday for work, but hasn’t shown up since. No call or anything.”  
“Oh Gemma,” Anne cursed a worry under her breath. 

**Day 3**

Thursday was much of the same. No calls. No texts. Her phone now went straight to voicemail. It must have run out of battery. No friends admitting that she had been hiding out at their homes just needing space. No sign of her as Harry took an aimless cab ride just hoping to spot anything that might give him some answers.

“Could you drop me at this address please?” Harry showed his phone to the driver, who he could tell was visibly annoyed at the fact that he had been driving around basically in circles for the last hour and a half. 

As the cab pulled to a stop, he gathered his work bag from the backseat and paid the driver, sure to tip him extra for his troubles, thought he knew he really couldn’t afford it.  
He looked up at the tall faded red brick building in front of him. The building that housed the flat that he should have moved into 8 months ago, but was too stubborn and thought a 26 year old man shouldn’t be living with his older sister, so instead he rented his own that was not nearly as nice or spacious or safe. 

He walked around the building, just looking for any kind of clue his amateur detective brain could find. The breath from his mouth formed clouds in the cold wind and all he could think about was Gemma being out in the cold. Scared. Alone. 

After he didn’t find anything remarkable, just some old trash discarded near the back garden, he mentally shouted at Gemma for never giving him the spare key that he knew she had on her key ring, right next to her own. Though, he wasn’t sure that he even really wanted to go inside; it would have been disappointing to find nothing at all or he may find something that he did not want to. He wasn’t sure which he was more afraid of. 

One thing was for sure, Gemma was missing. He had not heard from her in 54 hours. That was just too long for someone that he knew would, even if across the world with no signal or at a party with the volume maxed out, make sure to speak to her family at least once a day. 

Harry started the walk back to his home just as the sky burst open, soaking him down to his boots.


	3. Chapter 3

**Day 4**

“Harry, you all good mate?”  
Harry looked up to see his coworker, Liam, standing over his desk. Liam was one of the only people in the small office building that Harry would ever speak with and maybe even at sometimes considered a friend.  
He took a quick glance at himself in the small dirty mirror attached to the corner of his computer monitor, the dark circles under his eyes and deep creases in his forehead were likely visible from outer space. 

“Yeah, I just haven’t been erm- sleeping well. New neighbors or something.” Harry lied. He wanted to shout to the world that his dear sister was missing and he hadn’t slept more than a couple hours a night since Tuesday. Staying up, trying to think of where she could be, calling every hospital from London to Wales hoping she was simply in a small auto accident and they hadn’t been able to identify her or something simple like that. He didn’t want anyone else to worry for him or about him when he was still holding on hope that it was just a false alarm. 

“Well man, you look like the arse end of a bulldog.” Liam laughed, Harry sank deeper in his creaky desk chair that the office had promised to replace ages ago. “You want to go get some lunch?”  
“Sorry Liam, I’m going to try and get my work done and see if Jeffrey will let me go home a bit early.”  
“Good luck with that. Have a good weekend, yeah?” Liam left him to his work, which honestly he was just entirely to distracted to be paying attention to. All morning his mind was just set on going to the police station just as soon as he exited the office doors to find Gemma. 

Harry’s boss Jeffrey was an awful man to work for, always berating his employees for any minor errors or imperfections on reports. He had once made a new girl cry in front of everyone because the office’s ancient printer had jammed just as he was walking past her. She never returned after that. Harry had been working for Jeffrey for one year, 5 months and 17 days. One of the offices longest standing employees. He never pictured himself doing something as mundane as filing data or running sales reports, but it made him enough to get by. Though some days he questioned if getting by was enough. 

He had always been jealous that Gemma was working her dream job as a graphic designer for a fancy art studio in central London. She loved what she did and she had met so many interesting people doing it. But Harry was too scared to chase his dreams of being a nature photographer, so instead his camera sat unused in a box, in the corner of his flat, and he settled for an office with dim artificial lighting, dingy carpet from 1970 and a creaky old chair that he had unconsciously picked almost all of the plastic from the arms of. 

Harry prepared himself as he knocked on the door to Jeffrey’s office.  
“Come in” a voice shouted from the other side.  
Harry mustered all of his confidence before replying. “Hi, Mr Azoff, I’ve completed all of my tasks for today and I was hoping I may leave a bit early as I have an appoint-“  
He was cut off “Jesus, kid, you look like shit” Harry’s already dwindling self esteem was knocked down even further. “I hope that appointment is for a doctor. Do you have the flu or something? Get out of here, I don’t want that.”  
He accepted that as approval to leave and thanked Jeffrey on his way out. 

Harry quickly flagged down the first cab he spotted and sat eagerly in the backseat on the ride to the station.  
Once arrived, he raced out of the cab, nearly forgetting, but then returning to all but throw the £20 note at the driver. 

He walked through the doors of the grey 5 story concrete building into a large open room decorated with desks and scattered papers.  
“Can I help you sir?” A middle aged woman with glasses hanging on her nose sitting behind a large podium asked.  
“Hi, I need to speak with someone about a missing persons report.” Harry stated, nervously but also very distracted by the hustle of constant movement inside of the room.  
“Sure love, have a seat and I’ll send someone out in just a bit.” She smiled. 

Harry returned the gesture and found a bench across the hallway and had a seat. He pulled out his phone to send a quick text to his mother. 

Harry: I’m at the police now filing a report.  
Mum: Okay darling. Please let me know what they say. I wish I could be there. X

Anne had recently acquired a nursing degree after years of working in a real estate company with Harry’s ex step father. After their divorce, Anne wanted a fresh start, doing something that she always had a drive for, helping people. She had applied to several hospital jobs, but had only just been hired at Saint Joseph working insane shifts and couldn’t afford to miss any work, even though her daughter being gone was tearing her apart. Harry had told her that he would take care of all of the policing and searching so that all of her working efforts would not be ruined. He would report everything back to her and let her know if her presence was absolutely needed. 

“Are you missing someone kid?” A large voice asked from in front of the bench. Harry hadn’t even noticed him walk up.  
“Uh yes. My sister.” Harry replied.  
“Come with me, let’s get some info.”  
Harry followed the officer to a desk in the middle of the large room. He noted a picture on the desk of the officer and a young girl, presumably his daughter. Next to the picture was a name plate that read Officer Higgins. 

The man pulled up a program on his computer and began blazing through questions

Name, Age, Address, Last seen, Last spoken to, Employer, Boyfriend, Girlfriend, Ex lovers, Any known enemies, Any sign of wanting to take her own life, Any suspicious texts or calls, Regular hangouts, etc. 

Harry answered all of the questions to the best of his ability. 

Officer Higgins clicked away on his screen. 

“Do you think you’ll find her?” Harry asked, tears begging to be released from his eyes. In the last 3 days he had not cried once. He had choked back his emotions in effort to focus and honestly until now he had felt like he was in some sort of alternative universe because surely this couldn’t be happening to his clever and vigilant sister. 

“We’ll try Harry. Though if I’m honest, there doesn’t seem to be any red flags for Gemma to be missing or endangered. You’ll be assigned a detective, but if I had to guess, she probably just took a holiday without telling anyone.” Higgins was kind with his words, but that didn’t make them hurt any less. Gemma was not the kind of person to take random holidays without telling anyone. Sure she did her fair share of traveling, but never without sharing her entire detailed to the hour itinerary with Harry, their mom and at least one friend. Gemma was always overly prepared. She had lists for everything. She was safe and carried pepper spray on a keychain just in case. She was not careless. And she was not suicidal by any means. She was happy by all definitions. 

Harry found himself back on the bench in the corridor as advised to wait for a detective to come out to speak with him.  
He checked social media, still no status updates or friends tagging her in pictures or well, anything. Her most current status remained a picture of her and a friend, Gemma grinning ear to ear with a pair of odd shaped sunglasses while her friend made a funny face with her tongue sticking out. The caption read “Life is good.” 

“Harry Styles?” A man called from an office at the end of the hallway. The way that he said his name told Harry that he was from the north. Yorkshire, maybe.  
Harry grabbed his work bag and made his way down the long walkway. 

“Hello?” Harry asked as he stopped at the last open door frame.  
“Yeah, come in have a seat and close the door could ya?” The man asked not once looking up from the papers he was flipping through on his desk.  
Harry did as he was told and took a seat across from the man in a white shirt that was a bit wrinkled and black tie.  
“Alright, Mr Styles,” the man started. Harry quickly looked around the office to find a name plate or anything before landing on the mans face. 

He was a younger man, maybe only a year or two older than Harry himself. He wore reading glasses atop the brightest sea blue eyes. And had stubble lining his sharp jawline. 

“Harry,” Harry blurted out. “You can just call me Harry.” 

“Well okay Harry. I’m Detective Louis Tomlinson, but you can just call me Louis.” One side of his lip went up in a smirk. 

Harry nodded. 

Louis stacked the papers in front of him before tapping them on the desk to level out.  
“How bout let’s find that sister of yours then.”


	4. Chapter 4

**Day 4  
Louis**

“Fucking hell” Louis grunted as his hand felt around in the dark for his phone to turn off the persistent foghorn alarm that he dreaded every morning. 

After a quick shower to rinse away whatever alcohol was left in his body, he grabbed his wadded up shirt from atop the couch in his living room where he had ripped it off the night before.  
He glanced over at the ironing board folded up in the kitchen, “not a chance” he thought. 

Louis made himself a cup of tea before leaving his flat and heading to the station. 

Louis Tomlinson had been employed with the City of London Police for the past 6 years, applying for the academy the same day he received his A-Level test results. Despite the fact that he had never had any interest of his own to go into police work, it seemed as though his father and his father’s father had Louis’ whole life planned out. He was to become a detective, just as they were. Growing up, he had hoped that his mother would have another son, and that that son could take that path so that he wouldn’t be letting anyone down, but after 4 sisters, his wishes just never came true. 

He was quickly accepted into training courses and given gold stars, likely due to his name, and named one of London’s youngest detectives at the age of 26. It’s not that he was bad at his job or that he didn’t care about the work that he did, but he knew it wasn’t deserved as he had never been the one to crack open a huge case or arrested a top criminal. He was aware that others in the station were aware of this, and that didn’t exactly gain him any popularity, including with his reporting Sergeant. Louis avoided Sergeant Cowell anytime he was able and in return he was the last to get picked for cases. As long as he didn’t bring his retired father shame, he was fine with that. 

“Morning Helene.” Louis nodded as he walked past the reception desk. 

“Louis darling, how are you?” Helene asked with a large smile. Louis could rest easy knowing that at least one person in the station liked him regardless of who he shared DNA with. 

“Another day love. Have a good one.” He winked and made his way to his small office tucked away at the end of the hallway. 

Most of the day was spent staring at the clock hanging on his barren wall. He finished a report regarding a church vandalism and read through the details of a small group of kids selling pills at a local secondary school.  
He ran out for lunch, which consisted of a bag of takeaway chips and a cup of soda. 

When he returned to the station, he saw Officer Higgins through the glass panes of Cowell’s office. Cowell made direct eye contact with Louis and stood up from his chair. Louis froze as his body had an internal battle of whether to run or to stay. Before he could make up his mind, he heard,  
“You’re up Tommo.” 

Shit. He already knew it was probably another case that could easily be solved and he was just being made to do all of the paperwork to keep him busy. After all, that was basically what he was there for. Data entry with a detective salary. 

“Missing person. No evidence. Probably just a run away. Good luck.” Cowell handed Louis the printed report and gave him a sarcastic grin. 

“Thanks Sergeant.” Louis took the stack of papers into his office for review. There was actually a part of him that was excited for the case. Maybe this would take more than a couple hours and phone calls to solve. 

_Gemma Styles, age 30 missing since January 5th. Works at Hayward Gallery. Single. Lives alone. No known enemies. Brother is waiting for detective in reception._

Louis reread the information once more before sticking his head out of his office and calling out, “Harry Styles?”


	5. Chapter 5

**Day 5**

A loud knocking at the door woke Harry up from his restless sleep.  
After his meeting with Detective Tomlinson the day before, he had too much to look forward to. The two of them had spoken for over two hours, delving deeper into who Gemma was, what she enjoyed doing, who her friends were and places she visited the most.  


Harry told Louis that he wanted to be as involved as possible, to which Louis had no objection. It’s not as if anyone else at the station was jumping out of their seats to be his partner.

Louis spent the rest of the evening in his flat putting in emergency warrant email requests and trying his hardest not to look at the liquor cabinet in his dining room. 

Harry slipped on a t-shirt from the growing pile on top of his dresser and opened the door. 

“Good morning Harry,” Louis smiled and handed Harry a styrofoam cup filled with tea. 

“Detective Tomlinson.” Harry nodded while taking the drink. 

“Just Louis. Milk in the fridge?” Louis slid past Harry in the doorway. Harry noted the faint smell of alcohol on his cup or on his breath, he couldn’t quite determine the source. 

“So, I think first stop should be Gemma’s flat. That way we can rule that’s she’s not there, yeah? And go from there.” 

Harry agreed and took a sip of his tea. He was admittedly a bit nervous. He knew there could be a slim chance of finding Gemma there. She had never shown any signs of depression or wanting to end her own life, but as it usually goes, even those closest to you sometimes just never see them. 

He tried to keep calm on the drive over, distracting himself with the radio in Louis’ black Range Rover and picking at the already damaged skin around his fingernails.

As they pulled up, Gemma’s landlady met them at the door to her flat. Harry felt a little dumb for not previously contacting her, but with the million different directions his brain was going, and the slight optimism that she would return, he decided it was okay and maybe even better that he waited to have a detective join him so he wouldn’t have to go in alone. 

“Lovely girl this one. Always pays her dues on time and is quite friendly with her neighbors. I hope you find her.” The lady spoke as she handed Louis the key to unlock the door. 

“Thank you Miss Thomson, I’ll be in touch if anything else comes up.” Louis shook the woman’s hand and proceeded to turn the handle. 

“Do you want to wait? I can go in first, make sure it’s safe to enter.” Louis stopped mid turn to ask Harry. 

He shook his head. He needed to know. If his sister was inside, he needed to see her. 

Harry’s stomach was in knots as he heard the door click once, twice and three times. Louis pushed the olive green door open. 

Everything appeared completely normal. Harry took a couple steps inside noticing that it looked exactly as he had always remembered, neat, but cozy.  
He walked down the familiar hallway that led into Gemma’s bedroom, peaking into the bathroom and 2nd bedroom that Gemma had used as an office on his way. 

“Harry?” Louis called from where he stood in the living room, scribbling words in his notepad. “Don’t touch anything in there, okay?” 

“Okay” 

Harry took a deep breath and opened the door. 

The room was empty. 

Gemma wasn’t there. 

A huge weight dissolved from Harry’s chest. 

“She’s not here Louis.” Harry shouted. Although this was one small relief, he knew that if she wasn’t here in her flat, that meant that she could still be literally anywhere else in the world. 

Louis appeared behind Harry in the bedroom doorway with a first full of empty evidence bags in his hand. 

“I’m going to take a look, see if I can’t find her phone, computer, anything like that, okay?” Louis said almost in a whisper. 

“Okay. I’m going to go call my mum. Let her know.” 

After Louis finished collecting anything he deemed necessary or anything that looked out of place, he locked the door to the apartment and met Harry at the car. 

“Mum okay?” Louis asked as he packed up the trunk of the SUV. 

Harry nodded. “Shes worried. But I think this was a huge relief.” 

“Good.” Louis smiled and hopped into the drivers seat.

“Harry,” Louis turned towards the passenger seat, “we’re going to find her, I promise.”

**Author's Note:**

> Just an idea in my brain that I wanted to get out. Enjoy!


End file.
